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The sign above the stairs at the Centennial Room at the Te Rapa Racecourse read: All Welcome. And all were welcome at the funeral of firefighter Derek Francis Lovell. They spilled up the stairs on to the mezzanine floor, down the stairs into the racecourse.
The firefighters had
uniform requirements: full dress and medals - no caps.
The mourners who had come just because they might have known a firefighter or because they'd heard about a brave man looked casual in comparison.
There is no point competing with men in uniforms. A joke was made about what a brilliant fundraiser Mr Lovell was for child cancer.
His mate Brian "Whitey" White, whose speech left you in no doubt that real blokes can have real and loving friendships, heartfelt ones, alongside all the mutual joshing and jousting, said: "Who can resist a man in a uniform?"
Then he looked at the screen where the picture of his mate smiled out, the New Zealand flag behind him, waving in a breeze he won't feel again, and said: "He's pretty bloody handsome, isn't he?"
The media were made welcome, but were asked not to take pictures of the firefighter's family inside the service, or of his burned and injured workmates. Nobody would have wanted to take those pictures.
Two of Mr Lovell's colleagues were brought to the funeral in their hospital beds, bandaged beyond recognition, drips in their arms. One still wore his firefighter's blue shirt.
A collective in-take of breath as they came in, then people stood up as they went by, to honour them.
This service was about bravery, and these men - like the man they were determined to come to mourn - were the painful bandaged faces of that bravery.
A firefighter who heard me say, "God, they're brave to come today," said, "Very. It's just something they have to do."
Another sort of bravery: Milli Lovell, the firefighter's widow, looked beautiful in her big, race-day hat, and you got the feeling she had dressed up to look her very best, just for her husband. She spoke beautifully, too.
His mother Barbara had told her a story about how, when Derek was a little boy, he rescued a sparrow. Said Milli: "I guess I was his next bird."
And she told how staff at Waikato Hospital had said that although her husband could not survive his injuries, "his heart kept beating ... for so long".
She wore Mr Lovell's Gold Star, the award for 25 years of service, achieved the day he died, and presented to her at his service.
He had survived the ICI fire in Auckland in 1984, Brian White told us; he knew what fear was.
"Whitey, I absolutely shit myself," Mr Lovell told him.
There is little comfort to be had in knowing such things, but it is what firefighters live with. Hamilton's Chief Fire Officer, Gary Talbot, painted a picture of the life of the firefighter: "The jokes, the black humour ... the glow in the dark on the sky line ... the breaking of the timbers, the cracking of the glass. He knows that."
Derek Lovell sounded like a top bloke. A larrikin, a comedian, "a total one man, fairground sideshow".
In the photo on the order of service he wears his firefighter's shirt, his firefighter's moustache, and a tiny earring in his left ear.
I showed this to an old friend of his, retired fireman Laurie Bell, now a lieutenant in the Salvation Army, and he grinned and said, "Real men don't wear earrings. He was one of the first ... " He didn't need to say, "and one of the best".
There are such things as good funerals for good men. They are the ones where - even if you were at this funeral yesterday just because you wanted to honour a man you never knew, because he died doing his duty- you leave feeling as though he was someone you'd like to have had a beer with, someone you now knew a bit.
There was a montage of pictures from his life: he was a hunting, fishing sort of guy. He liked a beer. He liked hanging out with his beautiful wife and family. One image showed him shouting with the sheer joy of being alive.
"I'm sure," said Whitey, "everyone associated with Derek, will just say, `Bugger'."
Gary Talbot, at the end of his tribute said, "K47, mate". That's the call sign for "Stop. No further information".
Derek Lovell arrived at his funeral on an old red fire engine.
At the end, as his coffin was carried down the stairs, and the services, in their dress uniforms, stood to attention, the media photographers stood on the old fire engine and took their photos.
That was just fine with everybody there. Because when you are a private citizen who is a firefighter and you die in the line of duty, your death belongs to everyone.
